Son of Dr. Death Dave Fennell making mark in NCAA

Allen Cameron, Calgary Herald12.07.2012

Calgarian Dave Fennell transferred to an Oregon high school for his senior season in order to make it easier to get noticed by an NCAA school. The son of former Edmonton Eskimo Dave ‘Dr. Death’ Fennell redshirted for Michigan State this season.

Big Dave would be former Edmonton Eskimos defensive lineman Dave Fennell, A.K.A. Dr. Death from those legendary Alberta Crude defences that played a role in bringing five straight Grey Cup titles to Edmonton.

Young Dave would also be Dave Fennell — the son of Dr. Death who’s now making his own name as a defensive lineman south of the border in the early stages of his collegiate career at Michigan State.

Matthews coached Big Dave and helped Young Dave take a huge step in his football career, leaving Calgary after spending three years at Rundle College to enrol at Sunset High School in the Portland area for his senior season.

And Matthews, who has seen his share of football talent over the years, is blown away sometimes by how much Young Dave reminds him of Big Dave.

“Unbelievable,” exclaims Matthews in a phone interview from Oregon, where he’s battling cancer in his lymph nodes. “One game; he did a quick swim move over an offensive lineman and went in and just engulfed the quarterback. It reminded me so much of Big Dave that I had to laugh. It was the spitting image. Now, I don’t know if he has as much foot speed as Big Dave. Big Dave was quite fast in a straight line, probably a 4.7 guy (in a 40-yard sprint) and Young Dave is probably a 4.9. But Young Dave is working at his speed, and I don’t think Big Dave ever worked at it. He felt that running was a necessary evil. He felt that he only had so many running steps in his body so he wasn’t going to waste any doing drills.”

Young Dave (future references will be to Fennell and Big Dave to avoid confusion) hasn’t looked back since deciding following his Grade 11 season at Rundle that his best path to a U.S. college scholarship was via the U.S.

So after telling his dad he was ready to push his career to another level, arrangements were made for Fennell to move to Oregon and enrol at Sunset High School; he spent the summer at the Matthews residence before his dad set up an apartment to share with his son.

“It was a tough decision, leaving an environment you’re familiar with and leaving your friends and family behind,” says Fennell, a six-foot-two, 270-pounder who redshirted with the Spartans this season (he could practise and dress for games but wasn’t allowed to step on the field for a game). “But overall, I knew what my goals were. I wanted to go to school in the U.S. and I thought that would give me a better chance to do it.

“It was unfamiliar at the start,” adds Fennell, whose younger brother John is a rising star in luge and a prospect to slide for Canada at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. “I wasn’t knowledgeable about what I was getting into. But I was able to form some good relationships with my coaches and teammates and overall I had a great time at Sunset.”

It helped that Matthews gave him some ins. Prior to his brilliant CFL career, Matthews was the head coach at Sunset, and Sunset’s current head coach, Faustin Riley, was coached by Matthews at the University of Idaho.

Still, Fennell was just one of the crowd when he arrived for his first workout at Sunset compared to players who’d come up through the ranks for years.

But by the end of camp, Fennell had earned a starting job and been elected one of the team captains. He went on to earn defensive player of the year honours in the Portland Metro League and was a first-team state all-star.

“Some of the players he was playing against up in Canada were 185 pounds, 190 pounds, maybe 200 pounds,” says Matthews. David was 250 pounds, so it was a major mismatch. But his first play down here, he lined up against a kid who was six-six, 320 pounds. But he took that kid into the backfield, stuffed him and took down the quarterback AND the running back.”

(You can see that play and others like it on the YouTube highlight reel that was put together to attract interest from U.S. schools).

His football skills have spoken for themselves, but Big Dave is just as, if not more, proud of the work his son has done off the field.

“What I’m most proud of is that he’s doing his engineering degree at the same time,” says Big Dave. “You have to be pretty committed to want to do that. But he’s a very unique young man.”

In fact, where other schools tried to steer Fennell into a tamer general studies course load for his freshman year, the Spartans encouraged him to pursue his engineering goals, even if it means that Fennell hasn’t had anything remotely resembling a social life in East Lansing, Mich.

“I was pretty set on engineering from the start; it was definitely what I wanted to get into,” says Fennell, whose team is practising in preparation for the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl on Dec. 29 in Tempe, Ariz., against Texas Christian University. “I mean, sometimes it’s tough to find balance. You just have to organize yourself. I think I’ve got it figured out now. Most of the time I’m either going to school, going to practice, going to study hall and getting my stuff done.”

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